


Life And Death Are Of No Importance To Us

by afteriwake



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Mythology, Alternate Universe - Victorian, Botany, Butterflies, F/M, Gardener Molly, Gardens & Gardening, Grim Reapers, Molly is a Goddess, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, POV Alternating, Sherlock is a God, botanist Sherlock
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-12-15
Updated: 2018-06-18
Packaged: 2019-02-15 02:15:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 4
Words: 2,121
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13021122
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/afteriwake/pseuds/afteriwake
Summary: Molly is a minor goddess who takes souls to the Underworld for their judgment. Sherlock is also a god with the same powers, unbeknownst to him. When Molly is told she has to collect Sherlock's soul, it's the beginning of the most interesting week of their lives.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [sideofrawr](https://archiveofourown.org/users/sideofrawr/gifts).



> So this fic is inspired by [this picture](http://artbylexie.tumblr.com/post/116793297682/lostwithoutmyconsultingdetective-prompted) by **artbylexie** of Sherlock and Molly as Hades and Persephone, and I was inspired by it ages ago. She gave me her prompt for it (" _So, if it helps, my idea for H/P sherlolly was actually a little more Victorian, where Sherlock is a botanist that's really an ancient god but is buried deep in the sciences to help humans. Molly inherited the job of ushering souls and at the Great Exhibition, meets Sherlock. She falls in love with him and tricks him into her domain (Barts mortuary is the gate)._ ") but never got around to writing it. Then **sideofrawr** claimed it as a prompt and I am _just_ now writing it as my 1,500th fic on AO3.

She was lonely in the Underworld.

But Goddesses weren’t supposed to get lonely, of course. No, they were supposed to pine away after Gods or humans and take lovers and...no, that didn’t really appeal to her. Her heart was cold, most likely not even capable of romantic yearnings, much less romantic love, and after all, wasn’t any companionship fraught with complications? That was certainly something she didn’t need. While she was only a minor Goddess in the scheme of things, handling only one portion of the world to bring souls to their judgment, complications were something she certainly did not need. _Especially_ complications of the romantic nature.

But friendship...perhaps that might not be too bad.

She checked her garden again while she walked and thought. Her mystic dreamer dahlia was doing especially well, and the black baccara roses looked good. Most who stayed in the more pleasant parts of the underworld had gardens full of colour, bright and full of life, but for her, she preferred darker colors, if there was any color than black. It was the only real bit of life she got to keep for herself here.

The butterfly that signaled she had a soul to capture came and settled itself on her finger when she extended her arm. It never made a sound, as quiet as death itself, but once it touched her flesh she knew everything about the soul she was to collect.

This one was a simple job. Sherlock Holmes, London, due to be run over by a horse-drawn carriage. He had a week left to live, and while she could wait until the day of his death to go collect him, there was a thing that made her want to go now:

He was a botanist.

She had the gift to give life as well as take it, unlike many of those in her realm. That was how she managed such a beautiful garden here. And while colorful blooms were not particularly pleasant to her, the act of being able to grow things and use the knowledge to further more growth or cure diseases or make new plants fascinated her. Most people who died, no matter how interesting they were, were either sent to the beautiful part of her realm with bright skies and green grass and warmth, or down to the depths to be punished for their wickedness. Seldom few stayed where she was, a dark realm where it was more like the Earth above, except the dwellings were sparsely populated and few had any amenities.

Not that the Dead needed them, but if they moved farther afield, it was more like being alive than dead.

Still... _a botanist._ Perhaps he could teach her a few things before his death. She could only hope...


	2. Chapter 2

This would not do.

He did not mind the occasional interruptions into his research, but his colleagues trying to find a woman to “help him settle down”...preposterous. He did not _settle_. No woman would accept him anyway. Not with the strangeness he exhibited.

He had known, from an early age, he was different. There was something about him that allowed him to tend to plants more easily, to get them to grow and flourish with the barest of help. But he had maidenhead ferns survive in conditions that were unheard of without a greenhouse, cacti that grew in the freezing cold winters in London and actually bloomed without heat, and he was able to cultivate the most beautiful orchids, the envy of all he knew who grew them.

But around humans...it seemed his touch could yield lethal results.

He had once been in an argument with a boy when he was a lad, and he struck him across the face with a closed fist and the blow nearly broke the boy’s jaw. Not only that, he developed an infection, something that seemed commonplace, but it worsened quickly and in less than a fortnight he was being laid to rest. He thought nothing of it until his friend’s grandmother went to embrace him. When he embraced her back and pulled away, he saw a black butterfly settle n her shoulder.

She was dead the next evening.

He had vaguely recalled a butterfly touching the boy too, wings fluttering on his cheek before it flew away. It scared him, to think his connection to the two deaths were so intimate, that he had _known_ they were to die and done nothing to stop it, even if he had not known at the time. He vowed he would refrain from touch as much as possible and devote his life to helping people, saving whomever he could.

He was a wunderkind, they said. A genius in the field of botany. He had cultivated plants from seeds buried hundreds of years before, introducing new flora to the world. He had saved rare plants from dying, keeping the species of plant alive a bit longer. He was a genius.

But it was more than that, and he simply couldn’t put his finger on why he had this gift.

That didn’t matter at the moment, though. He crumpled the invitation to the party that John Watson had sent him a bit in his fist. John knew that, while he had been quite happy for him and his own romantic endeavours with Mary Morstan, such things were not for him. And the only reason there would be an invitation to the party was that either he or Mary had a woman waiting in the wings for an introduction.

No. He would not allow it.

As he went to tend to the black satin dahlias he had been drawn to trying to save, he watched as another of those black butterflies flittered into his greenhouse. How that was possible, he did not know, because it was closed up tight to fend off the coldest winter London had seen in an age it settled on his arm and he knew, then, his end was near. One week. He had one week left on this earth.

A sense of melancholy settled over him. While he had seen the buggers many times, they made no attempt to touch him. He would see them settle on a passing person or brush their wings on a person’s skin and then off they would fly. And now, there was another with news of his own death.

How he hated his second gift.

If only he could give life and not know when life was to end.

If only...


	3. Chapter 3

It had been some time since she had been up to the world of the humans. While she could easily camouflage herself to move amongst humans, most probably would not see her. Oh, some had the special gift, but to most there would be no discernible features for them to remember if they spoke to her or interacted with her in any way. She would, essentially, be a ghost.

It was good she was used to that, because it was an awfully lonely way to live, and she had been around since nearly the dawn of time.

She was not a typical goddess. More like a demigoddess, though she was not born of mortal blood. She simply wasn’t as strong as those that she interacted with who had names known to the humans. She was sure her name was set down somewhere, in some dusty ancient tome, but was that really important? She was, after all, little more than a ghost.

She knew her real name, but most did not, and she would give whatever name she had last used among the humans when asked. It was...easier, she thought at times, to be of little notice and little consequence, simply collecting her souls and leading them to the Underworld for their judgment and then going back to her home and her garden and the little bit of life she had there.

This...this was a very sharp departure to how she usually was. She had no idea if this Mr. Holmes would be able to sense her, but even simply observing as he worked, she hoped she could glean some of his knowledge. At the very least, she heard…

And then she stopped in her tracks. She had gotten direction to his home and had not expected to see roses blooming so beautifully in such weather. The sight filled her with delight and she went to examine a blooming flower, gently touching the red petals that were in stark contrast to the gloom around her that came from London. He must have some skill that bordered on the supernatural to get such a brilliant crop of roses to bloom in such cold weather.

Come to think of it, there was no trace of winter ugliness anywhere on the property she could see through the cast iron fence.

Most peculiar. 

Perhaps this Mr. Holmes was not all he seemed...


	4. Chapter 4

There was something alluring about the woman outside his gate. Oh, for the fashions of the time what she wore was rather old-fashioned, but it suited her short, slim form well. Her hair was pulled into some style that looked vaguely Greecian but her skin was as pale as his and not olive toned like those in that region. He had been there on botanical visits to save a dying species and had enjoyed the warmth for a time but soon found himself craving the coldness and darkness that was rampant in London. Gloom had seemed to suit him, as had loneliness and the company of his plants above the company of humans.

And knowing of his own impending death, perhaps that had been for the best.

But she was covertly trying to look towards his home, he could see that. And, perhaps, that was a sign from someone above that he should have some gumption and introduce himself. She might be looking for him, after all.

He moved down the street to where she was examining one of the few hardier genus of roses that he had saved, that managed to bloom, at least for him, nearly year-round with small breaks. It was the envy of every home in the vicinity because the rose petals were a luscious deep red trimmed at the edges with white. “Do you need any help, Miss…?”

She jumped back slightly, letting go of her hold on the rose. And then he saw it more clearly: the small crowd of butterflies gathered about her head and shoulder area, not settling on her but fluttering around, with one or two occasionally brushing a wing against her and, for a brief moment, her eyes glowing.

_She was like him._

“Margaret,” she said softly, her voice sounding British but he knew she was so much older than the country they were currently in. “Are you Sherlock Holmes?”

“I am,” he said, slightly dazed.

A smile blossomed on her face and he found himself transfixed. He had thought her plain from a distance, and while she was not a beauty to the extent of, say, the actress Irene Adler, she was still pleasant to look at. The smile only made her more charming. “I’d been hoping to speak to you. I’ve heard you have a gift with flora? And these roses..are they a testament to that?”

He nodded, simply staring as he willed himself to speak. “The butterflies,” he said finally before cursing himself for bringing that up.

Her eyes widened as she brought a gloved hand to her mouth. “You can see them?” she asked from behind her hands.

“I have since I was a boy,” he replied.

He could see the corners of her mouth begin to frown, even from behind her hands, and then she removed her hands and looked at him. “I think we need to have a most serious chat, Mr. Holmes,” she said quietly. “Somewhere private, because if you can see the butterflies...you can control the powers of life and death, and no human should be able to do that.”

Then it all clicked for him. “You’re here for me,” he murmured. “But I have a week.”

“I...have an interest in plants,” she replied, looking down. “I had hoped to learn from you.”

He was quiet for a moment, his mind whirring before he finally spoke again. “May I offer you tea? Or a sherry? Sherry might be best for this conversation, I think.”

“I think so too,” she said with a nod, giving him a small smile. Perhaps...well, if this was an example of those who had powers such as he had, perhaps there was something to his imminent death he could look forward to, much as that amazed him.


End file.
